25 Years of the PC: What Do You Remember?

August 12 marks the 25th anniversary of the introduction of the IBM PC. I still remember going to an announcement in Chicago, one of several locations where IBM had introductions that day, and thinking how important it was...

August 12 marks the 25th anniversary of the introduction of the IBM PC.

I still remember going to an announcement in Chicago, one of several locations where IBM had introductions that day, and thinking how important it was that IBM was getting into the PC business. It wasn't that the IBM PC was the first personal computer:MITS, Commodore, Apple and a host of others had paved the way, and by that time, I had already owned a couple of different machines and was using an Osborne 1. What made it special was that IBM - the undisputed leader of business computing - was getting into the market and acknowledging what a relatively small group of users already knew:that PCs were going to change the way business worked in some very fundamental ways.(I've written about the history of the PC a number of times.Here's a story I did to commemorate the 15th anniversary of PC Magazine, which contains a lot of my thoughts on the PC introduction.)

Of course, PCs did change how we all work.Many of the things we take for granted were still new at that time, and started to really come into their own after IBM entered the market.

In many ways, it's interesting to note that the things we did with PCs in the early days are still the most popular uses:even back then we had word processors, spreadsheets, graphics (not very good graphics, but...), communications (I had a 300 baud modem...), accounting software, games, and so forth.

But looking back, what's most amazing are the things we now take for granted that we weren't even thinking about then. Presentation graphics wasn't on the horizon - typically the graphics in those machines was crude, at best. (Indeed, most of the first PCs didn't have either color screens or a graphics controller.)Yes, we had communications and in fact, the Internet existed, but hardly anyone was using it and the World Wide Web was more than a decade away. You might send text to someone, but the concept of uploading or downloading pictures or music, wasn't even considered. There were games, but Adventure meant typing in text commands, not using a joystick to move around in a 3-D environment.And of course, none of us would have predicted that a bit more than 20 years later, the PC business would be dominated by companies like Dell and HP, or that IBM would sell its PC business to a Chinese company. How things have changed!

eWeek recently listed what it saw as the top 25products that defined the last 25 years, and this includes most of the usual suspects that I would name as well:the IBM PC, 1-2-3, dBase, the Compaq portable, the Macintosh, the 386, the web browser, Notes, Palm Pilot Microsoft Office.

But there are a lot of other products that have defined the changes that we've all seen that maybe don't get as much attention, or aren't seen as part of the PC revolution.

Here are some of my additions:

Add-on Boards - a lot of the old timers will remember how PCs never had enough components until things like the AST SixPack added a lot of features to one machine.Today, of course, all this is built in.

Graphics Boards - I remember the early ones from ATI, nVidia, Matrox, number 9, and AST.But I think it was the Amiga that first really showed the power of dedicated graphics on a PC-style machine.

The CD-ROM drive.Sony's original drive changed how software was distributed; and its sheer capacity (600 MB vs. the 1.44 MB floppies that predated it) changed the whole look of the software.

Sound Boards - The Creative Labs Sound Blaster meant decent music coming out of your PC instead of just occasional beeps and buzzes. Without it, we wouldn't have digital music, and our games would be a lot less interesting.

The "Clamshell" notebook computer.We had portable machines like the Compaq Portable and the Osborne for a while, and there were a few little dedicated machines like the Radio Shack Model 100. But the Toshiba T1000 was probably the first modern recognizable laptop. Monochrome of course, and DOS based.But it sure changed how I thought about computing.

Digital Cameras.I remember the first Apple digital camera, made by Kodak.By today's standards, it's laughable, but it launched a revolution.

The Laser Printer.Canon created the engine; Apple and HP the final hardware, and it changed how we printed. Goodbye dot-matrix...

The Inkjet printer.I still remember my first HP Thinkjet. It was slow, messy, and monochrome. And its descendents are how most of us print today. And add to that all-in-one printer, scanners, and copiers.

The Creative Nomad.The first high-capacity portable digital music player, which started a trend. And of course, the first iPod, which made it mainstream.

Decent browser.Mosaic was amazing, but it was Netscape that got everyone browsing in the early years.

Yahoo.How we found things on the web before Google. And still going strong today.

Napster.The original one. Not that you'd download anything illegally....And then iTunes.

Digital Camcorders. Sony and Canon pioneered this, but it was inexpensive video editing that made things.

Wireless Networks.Linksys and Netgear (and the 802.11 committee) get a lot of credit for making it mainstream, but I still remember our first waveLAN network we installed back at One Park Avenue.

I'd love to know:What do you remember about your first PC. And what would you add to the list of devices and programs that changed how you though about computing?

Michael J. Miller's Forward Thinking Blog: forwardthinking.pcmag.com
Michael J. Miller is chief information officer at Ziff Brothers Investments, a private investment firm. From 1991 to 2005, Miller was editor-in-chief of PC Magazine, responsible for the editorial direction, quality and presentation of the world's largest computer publication.
Until late 2006, Miller was the Chief Content Officer for Ziff Davis Media, responsible for overseeing the editorial positions of Ziff Davis's magazines, websites, and events. As Editorial Director for Ziff Davis Publishing since 1997, Miller took an active role in...
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